Former Thai Prime Minister in court for rice case trial

Bangkok (VNA) – Thailand’s former Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra will be at the Supreme Court on January 15 for the first hearing in her rice-pledging scheme trial, her lawyer said on January 14.

According to the lawyer, the former PM will be at the Supreme Court’s Criminal Division for Persons Holding Political Positions in Bangkok at 9.30 am for the first day of the hearing of prosecution witnesses.

The lawyer said he had already sent to the court questions to be posed to all prosecution witnesses, stressing his defence team would do the best as far as the law was concerned.

A source from the public prosecutors office said prosecutors would present four witnesses on the day. Nipon Poapongsakorn, former chairman of the Thailand Development Research Institute, would give the overall picture of the rice-pledging scheme. Other witnesses would be a reporter, deputy auditor general Prajuck Boonyoung and Jirachai Moonthongroy, a deputy permanent secretary of the PM's Office.

Yingluck has been charged with dereliction of duty causing damage under Session 157 of the Criminal Code, and failure to perform her duty as a state official under the Anti-Corruption Act, as she had failed to stop corruption in the rice-pledging scheme which reported losses of more than 500 billion baht (nearly 13.6 million USD) to the state.